RESEARCH ARTICLE Deep sampling of Hawaiian Caenorhabditis elegans reveals high genetic diversity and admixture with global populations Tim A Crombie1, Stefan Zdraljevic1,2, Daniel E Cook1,2, Robyn E Tanny1, Shannon C Brady1,2, Ye Wang1, Kathryn S Evans1,2, Steffen Hahnel1, Daehan Lee1, Briana C Rodriguez1, Gaotian Zhang1, Joost van der Zwagg1, Karin Kiontke3, Erik C Andersen1* 1Department of Molecular Biosciences, Northwestern University, Evanston, United States; 2Interdisciplinary Biological Sciences Program, Northwestern University, Evanston, United States; 3Department of Biology, New York University, New York, United States Abstract Hawaiian isolates of the nematode species Caenorhabditis elegans have long been known to harbor genetic diversity greater than the rest of the worldwide population, but this observation was supported by only a small number of wild strains. To better characterize the niche and genetic diversity of Hawaiian C. elegans and other Caenorhabditis species, we sampled different substrates and niches across the Hawaiian islands. We identified hundreds of new Caenorhabditis strains from known species and a new species, Caenorhabditis oiwi. Hawaiian C. elegans are found in cooler climates at high elevations but are not associated with any specific substrate, as compared to other Caenorhabditis species. Surprisingly, admixture analysis revealed evidence of shared ancestry between some Hawaiian and non-Hawaiian C. elegans strains. We suggest that the deep diversity we observed in Hawaii might represent patterns of ancestral C. elegans *For correspondence: genetic diversity in the species before human influence.
[email protected] Competing interests: The authors declare that no Introduction competing interests exist. Over the last 50 years, the nematode Caenorhabditis elegans has been central to many important Funding: See page 21 discoveries in the fields of developmental, cellular, and molecular biology.